Archie Bunker, Pa Ingalls, and the TV Dads Who Ruled the 1970s

In the 1970s, you could take your pick of the two most realistic dads ever to surface on TV: John Walton (Ralph Waite) of The Waltons, who held together a large family during the Depression years with calm forbearance and tolerance for all, and his polar opposite, the beleaguered Archie Bunker (Carroll O’Connor) of Norman Lear‘s groundbreaking All in the Family.

Everyone who saw Archie knew someone like him — cantankerous, spewing polarizing nonsense in impotent rage against a changing society — but we’d never seen his like on TV, and certainly not with such insight into a complicated character. You could hate what came out of his mouth, but there was no doubting his love for adult daughter Gloria (Sally Struthers).